At the dawn of the information era, backups of applications and data were stored on punch cards, tapes, and then disks. Now, virtual backups are created and stored on local and remote servers all across the globe. The ease of creating backups of data and of operating systems has led many individuals and organizations to create multitudes of redundant backups. Recently, the trend in data management is changing. Copy data management is a set of principles that suggests data should be kept in fewer places, rather than more. Ideally, under copy data management schemes, a full set of data should exist in only two places—in production and in a single complete backup. Other uses of the data set, such as test environments, should make use of differentials or snapshots, storing only the parts of the data that are changed rather than the entirety of the data set.
Unfortunately, traditional systems for creating and managing backups have not yet caught up. Many traditional systems for maintaining backups only allow for full, rather than partial, restorations of the data. Some traditional systems for creating backups may store the backup data in opaque formats that can't be read by other applications that may be attempting to create snapshots or differentials of the data. Accordingly, the instant disclosure identifies and addresses a need for additional and improved systems and methods for restoring data from opaque data backup streams.